The Robbed That Smiles
Chapter 02:
Author's Note: First: This is an alternate-timeline/universe story, so there will be deviations from canon. (I also only watched a handful of the movies and read only some fanfiction. Nothing else.)
To make it easier to differentiate between the two Lokis while reading/writing, I chose to tweak the spelling of Loki for the female one (Lokki); I've already written 7 chapters using this spelling for her, but I'm still trying to figure out a nickname for the Avengers to use for her, (since the pronunciation of Loki/Lokki is the same). Or should I just skip the nickname and leave room for 'humorous misunderstandings' to happen?
Also, there is a bit of swearing in this and future chapters, but I don't feel it warrants a higher rating than teen. Tell me in a review if you think otherwise.
"Is this really necessary?"
Loki watched quietly as the professed female version of himself grimaced at the seidr suppressing cuffs around her wrists before turning her sea-green gaze to the Avenger closest to her. Since being captured by him and Strange, the woman had been brought to the closest Avengers building - a holding facility owned and designed by Stark to deal with possible hostiles - where she'd received a welcome filled with an unsurprising degree of suspicion. Her claim to be him from a parallel universe, along with the fact that she attempted theft of a highly dangerous, potentially powerful artifact didn't exactly ingratiate herself with the heroes.
Nor with Loki, who had to deal with his brother and Stark threatening to lock him up since the two had initially thought the city wide illusion was one of his pranks. (Akin to the one he'd pulled on Banner the previous week.) It didn't help that when his female doppelganger dispelled her illusion, she'd also dispelled his earlier fix to the Statue of Liberty. Thus making the idea he was behind the mess more plausible in the minds of the Midgardians and their government.
"Yes, it is. Especially if you are who you claim." Stark replied, pressing some buttons on the array of computers in front of him. The displays depicted, as far as Loki could tell from the glimpses he stole, an analysis of pulse, respiration, brain activity and other vitals of the woman thief. Essentially it was a Midgardian 'lie-detecting' program, and Loki nearly rolled his eyes at the hubris that any version of himself would be flummoxed by such primitive technology. Not even Asgardian-level lie-detectors worked on him.
"I am who I claim to be. Lokki, master of mischief." The female sat back in the interrogation seat, exuding an air of indifference and boredom. Combined with her physical similarities to Loki - longish black hair pulled behind her back, fair complexion and defined cheekbones; piercing eyes that shifted between green and blue - left little doubt that she was connected to the mischief god. Whether she was another universe's version of Loki or a Jotunn relative of his trying to trick them remained to be seen. "Whether you believe me or not…is moot."
"Really? Why is that?" Natasha asked, sitting on a chair in front of Lokki. The two women stared at each other, the former with a mirthless smirk and the latter with a frown although there was a glimmer of amusement in the mischief goddess' eyes that Loki suspected only he noticed. At the very least, Natasha said nothing about it. "Because you think we'll let you go? Or because you're lying and just don't want to admit it kills you that we know it?"
An abrupt laugh was Lokki's answer, the amusement in her eyes spreading to the rest of her face. Its effect was two-fold - making the mischief goddess lose all calculated indifference and causing Natasha to scowl.
"You find that funny?" The assassin-turned-Avenger leaned in closer to Lokki, cold anger in her eyes. Like the other Avengers, she'd been close enough to the City of New York to witness the illusion of it being destroyed, and it put her in a less than tolerant mood. Despite it having been dispelled quickly, she was, as were the other Avengers, completely gobsmacked by how suddenly it happened. It drove home how unprepared they were.
"No." Said Lokki, a smile still on her face, although more subdued as was the glimmer in her eyes. Natasha's scowl deepened, scrutinizing the other, though the next one to speak was Banner who was glaring at Lokki.
"I suppose this is all a joke to you, same as the illusion of the city being destroyed." Banner growled, thinking about the prank Loki had played on him a week prior. The mischief god had created a similar illusion, albeit on a smaller scale, and then proceeded in trying to convince the scientist that the 'green guy' had done it. That prank had nearly driven Banner to first run away in remorse and then to almost kill the god when Loki revealed it was an illusion.
"No." Lokki tensed hearing the scientist, having been unaware of his presence as he'd only recently entered the room and had wordlessly sat to the side. From his vantage point, Loki smirked at his doppelganger's reaction to Banner, privately relishing that the female version of himself had a similar wariness of the 'green guy.' His amusement stemming from bruised pride for falling for the city-wide illusion. It morphed into intrigued as Loki realized it wasn't fear of Banner that Lokki's eyes reflected. It was something else.
"Really?"
"I...I did not mean any harm by it. I only wanted to secure a means home."
"A means home? How would casting an illusion of mass destruction and stealing a book get you home?" The scientist asked and stepped in front of the thief, while Natasha wordlessly backed off having realized, as had Stark and Loki, that Lokki was more responsive to Banner. Unlike the mischief god, the Avengers both assumed it was fear induced.
Loki stepped closer to the interrogation, his gaze locked on his doppelganger and the emotion in her sea-green eyes. It was fear, but wasn't fear of the scientist. The female version of himself seemed wholly unafraid of any of them - even when Stark threatened to imprison her in a volcano while she was being brought to the facility. (Lokki had flippantly boasted at being able to escape easily and had even tried. Strange, in response, had dropped her into another dimension, letting her fall endlessly until they arrived at the holding facility.)
"Well?" Banner crossed his arms, watching the professed goddess of mischief carefully, his vocal tone angry.
It was at that moment Loki saw it, the hurt in the other's eyes. Lasting for only a fraction of a second, he nonetheless saw it. And from that he quickly realized the emotion he read in his doppelganger's eyes. With Natasha it'd been nostalgia. With Banner, worry and then hurt, as though his anger being directed at her was unexpected. Like it cut into her.
"Are you…." Loki approached until he was just feet away from the interrogation, his brain lit by curiosity and arrogance. "The Avengers exist in your universe too, don't they?"
"Loki, what are you..."
"...or they did." Loki amended upon reading the look Lokki gave him at his interjection. Despondence. His own eyes gleamed in a mix of amazement and bewilderment, and he ignored the others protests at his interruption. "What happened to them?"
"Lok…" Stark started to reprimand the mischief maker, only to stop abruptly, his gaze drawn towards the computer readouts of Lokki's vitals. What had been mostly even-keel throughout the questioning had shifted drastically at the mischief god's inquiry. His eyes widened, and he looked at their captive.
Her fair cheeks were much paler, and her eyes colder and more piercing, with a hint of blood-red in the sea-hued irises. And the look on her face - it was fury. Fury and pain, and more fury. All of which was directed at Loki.
'Damn.' Stark muttered under his breath, feeling his heart thumping in his chest and his palms run cold as his body's natural fight or flight response kicked in. 'Note to self. Do not piss off the lady frost giant.'
Lokki seethed, standing up and glaring at her male counterpart. Her milky skin shifted into azure with raised markings, though a few shades lighter than his own Jotunn form, noted Loki. He also noticed how the seidr cuffs around the other's wrists slowly iced over, the material cracking under the frigid temperature of Jotunn skin.
"...fuck." Gasped Stark, as something started beeping from his computerized vitals scanner. Something that caused him to shout a warning at Natasha and Banner while typing something into the computer.
Loki didn't even have to peek at the computer screen to realize what had alarmed the Midgardian. He felt it. The cold. And in that moment he remembered something Odin had mentioned in one of his tales of the Jotunn-Asgard war.
-"Frost giants can reach body temperatures cold enough to freeze an enemy through on contact. The females can reach even colder temperatures. Enough to freeze a star, some legends say."-
"...those cuffs were designed to withstand extremely low temperatures. Right?" Natasha asked Stark, while she backed away, not wanting but preparing for a fight. As did Banner. Seconds later a force-field hummed to life in a circle around Lokki, having been initiated by Stark when he first noticed the dangerously low temperatures around the Jotunn thief.
"Not this low." Stark replied, the seidr cuffs in question visually cracking as he spoke, all but ready to shatter within seconds. That wasn't what was worrisome - after dealing with Loki and his antics for the past few years they knew how to deal with his abilities. Including those from his frost giant heritage. Thus combating a doppelganger of the mischief god wouldn't be too difficult.
Unless her frost giant body temperature got much lower or if the effect it was having on the air temperature around her spread beyond the force-field. None of their fighting skills and such would matter if they were frozen solid before reaching her.
"All right." Stark glanced at the vitals display, exhaling in relief when the temperature read started stabilizing. It still fell but at a much slower rate, assumingly reaching their captive's lowest sustainable temperature. "Now, if you'd..."
"Calm down?" Lokki muttered and approached the boundary edge of the force-field, stopping just short of touching it. There she stood regally with her head tilted to the side and her Jotunn body on full display. Not a stitch of clothing, real or seidr formed, covered her icy blue skin while the shattered remains of the seidr suppressing cuffs lay at her feet. A mischievous smirk tugging at her otherwise inexpressive lips, the goddess leered at the Avengers. "I am calm. Are you?"
"Uh…." Stark glanced over the Jotunn female, merely raising an eyebrow at the nude alien, while Banner turned away and Natasha rolled her eyes. Across the room, Loki gawked at his doppelganger, speechless and feeling strangely violated. "Sorry, but I left my adventurous youth behind years ago and am now in a committed relationshi..." Quipped Stark, before falling silent as Lokki transformed back into her Asgardian form, still without a shred of clothing. His eyes uninhibitedly roamed over her body, a habit from his philandering days.
The mischievous goddess smiled at the Midgardian, pulling back her onyx-black hair and adjusting her stance to allow an unfettered view of...everything. Her sea-hued eyes laughed silently as the overhead lights obliterated any obscuring shadows, allowing Stark full view of her fair-complexioned, smooth skinned Asgardian-form. "Like what you see?"
"What the bloody fucking hell?!" Loki reacted first, attempting to cast his own seidr spell to clothe his doppelganger, but failing as the force-field prevented any magics from passing through it. He then proceeded to cast an illusion spell in front of the force-field, darkening the view of anything below his female self's shoulders. For extra precaution, he expanded it the full circumference of the force-field cage.
"Aw…" Lokki glanced at the illusionary barrier and audibly pouted, though her expression simply showed amusement. Similar to that given by Loki whenever he was caught in the midst of a pulling prank. "You're no fun."
"Fun…?" The mischief god, mouth agape, stared at his female doppelganger, unsure how to respond. Or even what disturbed him more - that it was a female version of himself standing unabashedly naked and flirting with the Avengers or that said female version seemed to view her solicitous behavior as he did his pranks.
"Now that that's remedied," Natasha stepped forward, muttering a 'thanks' to Loki while scowling at the goddess. "Let's get back to interrogating this…"
"Hm?" Lokki narrowed her eyes at the red haired woman, daring the former assassin to finish her sentence. The two women glared coldly at each other, both observing the other, quietly judging and gauging what to say or not.
"...explain how you had a replacement statue already ready." The room door suddenly slid open and through it stepped Thor talking to Strange, with Rogers closely behind. The trio had been sent to deal with smoothing out the illusion scare with the city government as well as figuring out a more permanent fix for the Loki-statue fiasco.
"That is unimportant." Strange countered. "We should focus on what this new Lokki's arrival means and if she has anything to do with the Infin…." He abruptly fell silent as his gaze shifted from Thor towards the others already in the room. Glancing over the force-field around Lokki and the seidr illusion obscuring the view of everything below the Jotunn's shoulders, Strange frowned, his brow knit in curiosity. He hardly had to glance at Stark or the others to deduce what had happened.
"We'll get to that, but why did you already…." Thor said, oblivious to the surgeon-turned-sorcerer's shift in focus. At least until he glanced a second time at the scene greeting them. He'd done so when he'd first entered, but it was so quick his brain hardly registered what he saw. Once he did, he gaped, eyes widened, his eyes shifting between the cage and his fellow Avengers. "What in the…"
"...world?" Standing beside the Asgardian, Rogers quickly averted his gaze from the force-field cage once he realized the female Lokki was sans clothing. Embarrassed even with the seidr screen blocking out all but the thief's head, shoulders, and feet. "Why is she…."
Strange ignored Rogers and Thor, instead walking further into the room, barely fazed by the situation. As he approached, he noted the broken seidr cuffs on the floor by Lokki's feet and cocked an eyebrow. "Seems your interrogation isn't going as smoothly as you boasted it would." The sorcerer said, addressing Stark and referencing a claim the smug inventor had made earlier.
"On the contrary." Stark shook his head, denying Strange's observation. "Things went so smoothly that I offered Miss Frosty here a break to get more comfortable. The lady decided to go Au Naturel."
"Really?" Strange asked, not for a moment believing the smug man. Natasha and Banner both rolled their eyes at Stark's claim, while both Lokis gave a similar sardonic leer at the genius inventor. "What have you learned then? Aside from…" The sorcerer glanced at the broken seidr cuffs and then the vitals display, eyes narrowing at the temperature read. "...our friend being able to reach much lower temperatures than…." He glanced again at the cage, focusing on the flooring. Seconds later he grumbled and shook his head.
"Stra…."
"...Than these floors were made to endure." Strange continued, the next second teleporting away before his fellow Avengers could react or question what he meant. As though in answer to their unspoken inquiries, Lokki vanished - or rather the seidr formed illusion she'd cast of herself after her male-counterpart cast his censoring screen around the cage. So too did the floor, at least the part covering the person-wide hole that Lokki had shattered open using her frost magic.
"What the…."
"Did she actually…?"
"Yep." Stark replied, his pride bruised by falling for the female Jotunn's sleight of hand despite being prepared - after all he'd dealt with their universe's Loki's antics constantly for the past handful of years and thus uncovered much of the mischief god's repertoire.
"We should go after her. Hopefully she didn't get far." Said Thor to his fellow Avengers, before addressing Loki, who just stared at the empty cage. "I'm surprised you didn't catch onto her, brother."
Loki didn't respond immediately, and instead just watched the cage, his expression shifting from bewildered to fascinated to amused. His brother's footsteps approaching him pulled him from his silent retrospection. "She...is good. Do you know how precisely she had to cast her spell after mine for me not to notice?"
Thor shook his head, while Stark muttered some off-the-cuff comment about Loki's fascination with his female doppelganger. The mischief god bristled.
"You're the one who couldn't stop looking at her! Not to mention your flirting…." Loki cringed, remembering.
"She flirted. I just played along."
"You…"
"What…?" Thor started to ask but stopped, not wanting to delve into what had occurred or why the female-doppelganger of his brother was naked. He especially didn't want to hear anything about...well, that sort of thing. Especially not about someone who, if she was telling the truth, was essentially his sister, albeit adopted and from another universe. "Let's just go find Lo...sister Lokki, before she causes trouble or casts another city wide illusion."
"You know, calling them both 'Loki' will probably be confusing in the long run." Banner interrupted, cutting off Stark who seemed about to make a quip about Thor calling the female Jotunn 'sister Lokki.' "We should probably find a solution after we find her though."
"After." Thor agreed, while Stark shrugged and stalked off to scan the city for any possible sightings of the female Jotunn. "Brother, let's…."
"I'm going to stay here." Loki said, stepping towards the computer screens that had depicted his doppelganger's vitals. The moment her illusion spell dropped inside the force-field, the computer screen too had changed, as though it had also been magicked by Lokki. Something the frost giantess probably did the second after she broke through the floor. "It's better if you're only looking for one of me." The mischief god explained after sensing Banner and Stark glaring at him.
"Fine." Stark muttered, while Banner indicated he was also staying behind - partly to watch Loki, but mostly because he likely was unnecessary. Although Lokki was an unevaluated threat, she hadn't caused any actual damage (aside from a few bookshelves), thus the 'green guy' wasn't likely needed. "Banner, you know what to do if he tries anything."
Rolling his eyes at the Midgardian, Loki slid onto a chair and picked up what the Midgardians called an e-reader from a nearby table. (After figuring out that a decent book could entertain the mischief god away from pranks, at least for a while, the Avengers had gotten an e-reader for Loki as a Christmas gift one year.) Leaning back in the chair, Loki scrolled through the selection of books available on the e-reader, seemingly uninterested in his brother or the Midgardians.
The moment everyone but Banner left the room, Loki glanced up from the tablet. His lips twitched, pulling into a grin he attempted to subdue, lest the scientist caught on. His gaze swiftly returned to the e-reader screen when he heard Banner move. He remained reading for a while, until he noticed Banner heading toward another computer - the same one Stark had started up to scan the city for Lokki.
Once Banner wasn't facing him, Loki pressed a few keys on the computer closest to him. The same one Stark had used to boot-up the force-field. He, however, now powered it down.
Banner immediately noticed and stood up. "Loki, what the hell are you up to?"
"Clever. She is clever." Loki muttered, ignoring Banner and instead approached the space where the force-field was. He heard Banner repeat his question, voice a bit more irritated, but aside from tensing slightly, he ignored it again. Seconds later, Loki smirked and cast his seidr over the area closest to the broken floor, having caught sight of something.
"I'm warning you, Loki. What…"
"...the fuck!" Growled Loki's female doppelganger, having suddenly reappeared on the floor beside the broken seidr cuffs. A heavy scowl marred her face as she glowered at the mischief god. "You son of a…."
"Hey!" Loki scowled at his doppelganger.
"...bastard." Lokki finished, pushing herself to her feet; her form fully clothed thanks to Loki's spell. One that she decided not to try and dispel. "Ruining a perfectly good escape. Tchk. Clever bastard."
"What the hell is going on?!" Banner exclaimed, eyes darting from one Loki to the other.
"Simple. Selfie here didn't escape through the hole. She transformed herself into a tiny arthropod and hid in the remains of the seidr cuffs." Loki explained, crossing his arms and looking smugly at his doppelganger. "Pretty clever. Except you shouldn't have transformed into a Silver-Hair Basilisk, noticed you right away."
"Basilisk?" Muttered Banner, wondering if he heard the mischief god right.
"It's a type of spider. Native to Asgard and Jotunheim. Its venom is able to petrify insects and small mammals." Lokki replied before her male counterpart, her own arms crossed and jaw pulled taut. "They have been known to make it to other realms, brought along by inattentive travelers of the Bifrost."
Loki shook his head. "Not to Midgard. Not since the Jotunn Invasion and not in this climate - too close to the ocean."
Opening her mouth to refute her male-counterpart, Lokki clammed up and grimaced, realizing her mistake. The Silver Hair spider quickly died if exposed to salt water or salty air. New York City was much too close to the ocean for the arthropod to survive, thus her choice to transform into one was as obvious as strapping a neon sign to herself.
"Yeah, yeah. You got me. Now what?" Lokki muttered, frowning. "Going to call back the calvary? Show off your clever deduction and capture and all that?"
Loki thought a moment, before shrugging and shaking his head. "No. Let's let them look around some. It'll simply make it more hilarious when they return." He turned towards Banner. "Unless Jolly Green Giant here wants to tattletale?"
Banner glowered at Loki, ready to call Stark and the others simply to annoy the mischief god. His determination faltered when he glanced at the female Lokki and saw her pouting at him. Her sea-hued eyes wide and oblique, her bottom lip protruding in an over-the-top frown, Lokki seemed both comical and childlike, and so different than the sarcastic mischief god.
"Please? Just for a little while. Pwetty pwease?" Lokki purred, gazing up at Banner, having lain back down on the floor when she started to beseech the scientist.
"What the flying fuck?!" Loki gawked at his doppelganger, unsure whether he was more uncomfortable seeing this display or seeing his female double flirting with Stark. Banner, to his credit, just rolled his eyes and facepalmed, taking Lokki's pouting no more seriously than Stark had her flirting.
Noticing this, Lokki sat up straight and stopped pouting. Sighing, she shrugged. "I'll answer some questions for you, if you want. Or, I guess I could just go back to flirting with Tony. Hm, that might be fun...You can go call him back now."
"No. Please. No." Loki, wide-eyed, shook his head. A similar expression was on Banner's face.
"All right." Banner replied, muttering to himself before addressing Lokki. "So long as you answer a few questions, and do so truthfully, I'll give you an hour before I call the others back."
"Deal. Where to start?" Lokki asked, sitting down on the closest chair, which was the same one she'd been seated on earlier. Before she got furious and shifted into her Jotunn form. She made sure though, to move the chair just outside the force-field's boundary.
"For starters, are…."
"Why did you get mad when I asked about the Avengers of your universe?" Loki interrupted, scrutinizing his doppelganger, whose severe reaction to his questions earlier had made him cautious but hadn't quelled his curiosity. He peered at her, not afraid but readying one of his knives out of sight as a precaution.
If the female Jotunn was him from another universe, just female rather than male, he understood how she would fight. And though she may have fiercer frost magic than him as a consequence of her sex, he hadn't failed to notice how thoroughly she avoided actual combat, instead focusing solely on illusion magic.
"Loki." Banner warned the mischief god, his tone enough to get Loki to flinch on reflex before glaring back.
"What?" Snapped Loki, a sneer on his face that was more a mask than an actual reflection of enjoyment. "You're curious yourself. You can't say you're not, not after witnessing Selfie's reaction earlier. It was over-the-top, even for…" The bite of a knife at his throat quieted the mischief god, and he peered into a pair of eyes identical to his own. His lips twitched, his own knife pressed against his doppelganger's abdomen.
"Oi. Come on you two." Muttered Banner, reaching for his cell phone. His patience running thin, too thin to care about getting answers out of the female Jotunn before anyone else.
Lokki blanched, feeling Loki's blade against her stomach - it was obvious she had expected her male doppelganger to copy her 'knife against the throat' move. Not go for the 'less lethal' abdomen shot. She stared into her double's face, reading it as clearly as her own. The two of them remained quiet for a moment, communicating wordlessly.
"I said…." Banner growled, midway to dialing up Stark. His brow knit when the female Jotunn backed down first, removing her knife against Loki's neck. It disappeared in a puff of smoke. The scientist's eyes narrowed, perplexed, even more so when Lokki returned to her chair without much fuss. "...what?"
For his part, Loki sighed and stared at his doppelganger with a look on his face that for one of the rarest moments in his life, seemed contrite. Uncomfortable with himself. He kept his knife clasped in his hand though, now safely at his side. After a few heavy moments of silence, the mischief god opened his mouth to speak. "Look, I didn't…."
"You want to know that badly?" Lokki spat, avoiding eye contact with both Banner and Loki, her arms folded defensively across her abdomen. "...they died. All of them. Along with most of Midgard and the rest of the Nine realms. Most of the whole fucking universe." Her piercing, furious eyes glared up at Loki, while she reflexively shielded her abdomen, wary of the knife her doppelganger held. "Thanks to those fucking Infinity Stones."